It looks like Sony might be finally moving on from some of their older hardware. According to report by The Gamer, Sony is planning on shutting down the PSN Online Store for the PlayStation 3, PSP, and the PS Vita later this Summer. The post, which was given by a “verified source” claims that the PlayStation 3 and PSP stores will be the first to go, with the tentative shut down date of July 2, only a few months from now. The PS Vita store will apparently remain active until August 27, only a couple of months difference from the other two.
The post also states that an official announcement is expected to come by the end of March, and with only so many days left in the month, that means it could be any day now. No clear reason was given as to why the PS Vita store is being saved for last, but either way, once the respective store is shut down for that platform, you won’t be able to purchase digital titles or DLC on it anymore. The report also did not elaborate if owners of digital titles would be able to re-download their purchased games after the store is shut down.
As we already mentioned, Sony has yet to officially make an announcement on this situation, but don’t be surprised if they do end up revealing this to be the case later this month. It’s also not very surprising considering that a vast majority of PlayStation players have moved on from those three platforms. Sony’s PlayStation 4 is still dominated by a lot of concurrent players, and their new system, the PlayStation 5, has also gained a lot of users, new and old.
However, the most unfortunate thing to come out of this is the fact that some titles will potentially be lost as the PlayStation 4, and PlayStation 5 are not backwards compatible with PlayStation 3, PSP, and PS Vita games. While Sony does have the PlayStation Now subscription service, it’s just not the same for a lot of gamers who prefer to actually own their titles, physical and digital. Hopefully, Sony will introduce a new feature or plans to bring a lot of those titles to the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5 as Classics, but we’ll just have to wait if/they announced anything by the end of the month.